MY PAGES

Monday, April 15, 2013

CULTURAL SHOCK

Marivi Soliven's debut novel, THE MANGO
BRIDE, is more than a story about immigrants and their struggle to
adapt to a new country. It is a kaleidoscopic view of a fascinating
place where clashes between East and West resulted in a
gorgeously rich culture. Told by an omniscient narrator, this is the
story of two Pinoya women, Amparo Duarte and Beverly Obejas, whose
reasons to leave the Philippines are as different as the social
classes into which they were born. Amparo is an upper class
university student from family for whom decorum and honour are all
important. Beverly, the daughter of a maid, is a clerk at a shoe
store. While Amparo seems to have no particular goals, Beverly dreams
of a future that will turn her dream of a house with three bedrooms into reality. For that, she is willing to follow a stranger to America though she risks
breaking her connection to her only relative, Marcela, a cook at the
Duarte household. Leaving the Filipines is not Amparo's choice, but rather is a punishment dealt
by her biological mother Conchita, a petty, vulgar woman
who delegates nearly everything, including the mothering of her own
children to Marcela.

Amparo is Soliven's most successful
character. She starts out as a pliant young girl defined by the
demands of her family, passively awaiting for a husband to add the
finishing touches to her character. When she eventually rebels against the conventions of her social class, her life changes radically. Horrible Conchita, whose only emotion seems to be anger, waxes indignant. Never mind that Amparo's lapse has to do with a rule so absurdly dated and dusty it is difficult to
believe it could have such far reaching consequences. But the Spanish
concept of honour, in which the Islamic notions of women's role in
society had such a profound influence, appears to be alive and well
in Amparo's Filipines. Add to that Catholic morality and you might as well negate any progress women have made since the Dark Ages.

Ironically, it is this outdated notion
of honour that propels Amparo out her her stifling bell jar and into
a broader, more forgiving setting where she can transition into
adulthood. Hers is not the typical struggle of unskilled,
economically challenged immigrants. Undoubtedly she misses home, her
dysfunctional family and the advantages she had in the Philippines,
but compared to Beverly's plight, hers is an easy life. Married to a
controlling man who mocks her national origin, who will not allow her
to make friends, Beverly endures social isolation, physical abuse
and a worst kind of servitude than she could have possibly have
imagined.

Solingen does a good job of contrasting
the experiences of both women, juxtaposing their losses and gains--
Amparo gains in freedom, but she loses a sense of belonging. Beverly
loses her freedom, but gains a different perspective on her old
life. Solingen writes movingly about the ache for what these two
women left behind. She really shines when she evokes the sounds,
scents and texture of the country they left behind.

Unfortunately, America is a blurry
snapshot in this story and American men are caricatures.

Amparo's boyfriend, Seamus,the yoga
instructor, fares slightly better that the two elderly clients of
Filipino Sweetheart, an agency that offers young women “as sweet
as mangoes” to elderly American men in search of docile children
brides. But Seamus is a stock character—the sensitive blur while
Joshua and Lydell are of villains the likes of which have not been
seen since The Perils of Pauline.One expects them to twirl their
mustachios right after they tie their womenfolk to railroad tracks.
Their one-dimensional Filipino counterparts are no less
flawed--Conchita is a rerun of Lupita, a grasping, chain smoking
harridan hellbent on flaunting her acquisitive and her pedigree. Her
friend Carina is just another conspicuous consumer. The anguish of
having no real goals, of living with adulterous, childish husbands
does not redeem them ecause they are too concerned with the
superficial to notice that theirs is a hollow world. Pity they are
too old to be mango brides. They and the American caricatures that
keep Filipino Sweetheart in business deserve each other. In real
life, they might exist in droves, but such is the nature of good
fiction that fully realised characters have a few more facets and at
least a hint of humanity.

.

Unlike some of its characters, THE
MANGO BRIDE has depth when it deals with the older Filipino exiles
eeking out a living in california. It has tenderness, beauty and
brilliant flashes of humour.

Had Solingen had a less indulgent
editor, this would have been a better book. Nevertheless this is a
promising beginning and a very welcome one. Filipino American
fiction writers have been woefully underrepresented in America. It is
high time for a change.

MORE LINKS

IN THEIR WORDS

"Would you not like to try all sorts of lives--one is so very small--but that is the satisfaction of writing--one can impersonate so many people. " Katherine Mansfield

AMBIGUOUS CHEKHOV

"I abide by a rule concerning reviews: I will never ask, neither in writing nor in person, that a word be put in about my book.... One feels cleaner this way. When someone asks that his book be reviewed he risks running up against a vulgarity offensive to authorial sensibilities.''

"Isolation in creative work is an onerous thing. Better to have negative criticism than nothing at all."

"Despite your best efforts, you could not invent a better police force for literature than criticism and the author’s own conscience."